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Adulthood Non-fiction Observations Seasonal

How’s your January?

Bleak, dismal, grey, tiring, sad, long, monotonous, cold, dark. These are a few words that people use to describe the month of January. How is yours going?

The period after Christmas is always strange. The new year brings a lot of excitement and anticipation initially, but a week in and everyone is scared of the change, worn out by the darkness and fed up with the cold.

I am a firm believer of the condition S.A.D which stands for seasonal affective disorder that many people suffer during the darker winter months.

I’m not afraid to admit that some days during this difficult month I have cried for no reason. I have panicked about the future unnecessarily. I have felt tired and exhausted wondering where I am going wrong in life and then I look outside and realise that it is pitch black and only 3pm.

I wake up in darkness, walk to work in darkness and leave work in darkness. My toes and fingers have threatened to fall off due to being freezing cold. I am running out of warm jumpers because they are all in the wash. My motivation is lacking most days. I feel overwhelmed with my year’s to-do list!

The memes fill social media describing the ninety fifth day of January. The weather reporters bring news of more rain, grey skies and the big freeze. Outside looks bare and spring seems miles away.

However, while running on an extremely bright and beautiful morning this week I discovered some perks to this godawful first month of the year and decided that there are ways to appreciate January as much as any other month:

  • the hope of spring is around the corner
  • there is still beautiful sunshine
  • glistening frost
  • wood burners
  • appreciation of a thick coat
  • there are buds on the trees
  • the first signs of daffodils start to appear
  • dogs look really cute in coats

So there we have it. January. A depressing yet hopeful, beautiful month.